


When All is Lost (We'll Make it Through)

by Morbidocity



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: AU, Angst, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Drama, Eventual Smut, M/M, Past Relationships, Plot, Rebellion, Stucky - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-24
Updated: 2014-09-24
Packaged: 2018-02-18 14:05:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2351084
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Morbidocity/pseuds/Morbidocity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In 1944, Steve Rogers puts down the plane that's set on a crash course into the ice of the Arctic.  He saves hundreds of lives that day but unfortunately his body is never recovered.  Now, he awakens in 2012 and he finds that things certainly have changed-- for the worse. Nazi Germany won the war in 1945, a mere year after Steve put the plane down. HYDRA acts as the German enforcement, keeping the world in fear and compliance as the Nazis rule over it. Concentration camps, laborer camps, strict curfews and worldwide poverty are just some of the problems with the German rule. </p><p>What the Germans don't know is that there is an old problem ready to reignite under the streets of New York City. Through the near seventy years that Steve Rogers has been on ice, there have been multiple attempts to overthrow the Nazi rule but all rebellion attempts have failed. People have lost their lives and other rebels have been captured.  But now that the rebel alliance, SHIELD, has Captain Rogers back on their side, things might finally be in their favor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**1944**

**Somewhere over the Artic**

 

 

Since he’d been little, Steve Rogers had only ever dreamed of being this kind of man.  He could remember dozens of accounts where he’d play soldiers with the kids down the block, always trying to be the hero only to have those fantasies taken away when one of the kids pointed out his ailments.  Growing up, Steve Rogers had only ever wanted to be the good guy.  There was something stubborn about him, his momma always said.  She was exactly right.

Where Steve’s ailments should have stopped him from trying to play the hero he’d always dreamed he could be, they didn’t.  He was sure it went back to that stubbornness his mother always said he had, his mother had always been a smart woman so he guessed it must be true.  Not many people looked twice at him and why would they?  A scrawny asthmatic kid who wore too big of clothing and who’s bark was often worse than his bite.  But what Steve lacked in the exterior appearance, he made up for in the inner. 

If you were to ask anyone to count on their fingers just how many times little ol’ Steve Rogers got kicked around in a back alley brawl, they’d run out of fingers to count on.  Thing was, Steve was always picking fights with guy’s two times his size.  But it wasn’t out of the itch to fight or just a bad temper, Steve Rogers had the kind of moral code women only dreamt about in a man.  He stuck up for just about anyone in need of it, rushed to the defense of a dame in trouble, and told rowdy hooligans in the theatre to shut their traps and have some respect when they’d holler rude comments at the screen during the short films about serving the country.

And then there was Steve’s determination.  Steve Rogers couldn’t count on two hands how many times people had told him to give up on enlisting.  He was too scrawny and too sickly for the military to even consider taking him in.  But he wouldn’t give up ‘cause why should he have to sit back while other men were giving their lives for their country—his country?

Steve Rogers never would have thought that he’d be that hero now.

“-- I’m in the middle of nowhere.  If I wait any longer a lot of people are gonna die.”

There’s a soft click in the silence that follows, his compass with the black and white photograph of an all too beautiful girl is set on the top of the glass encasing the airplane’s meters.  “Peggy… This is my choice.”

 If Steve’s hands were bare of the red gloves he wore, the knuckles would be bone white as they gripped the pilot’s yoke.  Steve’s eyes flicker down to the scanner, watches as the little plane icon moves from over the water and to the spotted white signifying the ice.  “Peggy…”

Despite the amount of static over the secured channel they’re using, Steve can still make out the almost weak sounding answer, “I’m here.”

Through the clouds, he can see the icy waters and the white peaks that were to be his final resting place.  This certainly hadn’t been how he’d ever thought he’d go out but he can at least know he’s doing it saving those people. 

“I’m gonna need a rain check on that dance.”

There’s a soft sniffle on the other end of the communications line and as if this scenario didn’t hurt Steve enough, that sound certainly would.  “Alright.” He can hear her say, just as softly.  “A week next Saturday at the Stork Club.”

The sound of the air displacement on the body of the plane around him is almost deafening.  He’s going down fast, his hands clenched tightly around each stick of the yoke to hold it steady.  “You got it.”

“Eight o’clock on the dot.  Don’t you dare be late.  Understood?”  Peggy’s voice is a little steadier now, a little surer as if she had faith in him to find an out.  He’s pretty sure they both know that there’s no out of this scenario.

The stark white plains of ice are getting bigger, closer… and he knows it’s just a matter of time before the impact hits.  He can’t take his eyes off of them, can’t look away for fear of how soon the end will come.  Will it hurt, he can’t help but wonder, or will the impact be so sudden that it will be like going to sleep? 

“Y’know I still don’t know how to dance.”

For a brief moment, Steve almost thinks he can hear Peggy give a light, almost inaudible chuckle.  “I’ll show you how.  Just be there.” 

The ice is coming up faster now and Steve pulls up on the wheel to sort of level the plane out, watching as the white levels with the belly as best as he can.  “We’ll have the band play somethin’ slow.”  He says, any moment now he’d be at the end of his line.  “I’d hate to step on your--“

There’s a loud crash that he hears around him… but he doesn’t feel it.

 

-

 

**2012**

**New York City**

 

 

Everything starts coming to him slowly; voices that sound all too distant, the smell of cleaner (something different than how a hospital would smell), and a dim light that cuts through the darkness behind him eyes.  It’s the thought that hits him faster than anything else; he shouldn’t be here.  He’d put that plane down into the icy waters of the Artic… he should be dead.

Steve opens his eyes, squinting at the new exposure of light as he tries to take in his surroundings.  It’s a small room, unusually dark save for the one lamp just next to his head and the scatter of candles along the shelf tops.  The walls are darkly painted to match the floor and ceiling and the furniture looks outdated and almost antique.  It’s certainly not a hospital.

There’s a soft clink as the curtain closing the room (not really a room, Steve observes, but more of an alcove of something bigger) off is pulled back allowing a thin red-headed woman to step into the room.  She’s wearing dark clothing and Steve swears those jeans are nearly painted on, the only loose article being her hoodie which seemed almost two sizes too big.  Her hair hung in loose waves down to the middle of her back, contrasting against the ivory pale of her skin, but it was her lips that really stood out to Steve; bright red and full, reminding him of a woman he used to know-- a woman he owed a dance.

“It’s good to see you’re awake.”  Her voice is smooth as silk and her painted lips quirk up into a one-sided smile that Steve thinks could hold more mischief than good.  “I wasn’t sure they’d be able to pull you out of your sleep with the resources we’ve got.  We’re kind of… limited.”

Steve narrows his eyes then, curls the fingers of his left hand in the ratty material of the blanket covering him.  He catches the way her emerald colored hues flicker down at the movement, as if nothing could escape her gaze.  She doesn’t move however, remains standing still in the same spot.  “What do you mean limited?  This isn’t a hospital… who are you?” 

“Mr. Rogers, I advise you calm down.”  The woman speaks.  She’s centered between him and the exit out of the little not-room, as if her tiny body would be much use against his bulk.  “It’s going to be a little complicated to explain.  We didn’t want to break this all to you at once but as I said, our resources are limited.  We would have preferred to ease you into it but we didn’t have the means to do so.”

It all sounds extremely suspicious to Steve and the setting makes it seem like he’s fallen into the wrong hands.  Waking up in some dark room with a woman who seems just as shady as the surroundings was one thing that had never been on Steve’s To-Do list.

His eyes flicker once more to the thin curtain separating them from whatever was on the outside and then flit back to her, calculating just how quickly he can move past her.  He didn’t exactly want to hit a woman but if this was enemy territory, he wouldn’t be against it.

“Mr. Rogers…”

Whatever warning was bound to follow, Steve doesn’t sit still to listen. 

The blanket flutters as he throws it off, legs swinging to the rough floor.  It’s a bit tipsy at first, as if he hadn’t been able to use his legs in what could have been years.  He supposed crash landing your plane in the Artic would do that to you.

There’s a short scuffle as the woman moves to better block the door but Steve ducks under, slides just below her and pushes himself up to stand once outside the curtained door.  It’s just as dimly lit out here but in sections rather than how his room had been.  Every few yards there’s a large standing light giving out a bright shine that illuminates the section before going dim for a short period.  It looks to be some sort of tunnel but Steve doesn’t stick around long enough to fully take it in.

He can feel gravel and dirt underneath his feet, rubble of some sort and while the sharp bits dig uncomfortably into the soles of his feet it’s not enough to slow him down.  His shoulder crashes into someone and there’s a low grunt, a flutter of paperwork hitting the ground.  “Hey!” Comes the irritated voice and Steve turns away from him to continue on his escape route. 

“Widow!” He thinks he can hear someone yell in the distance, the voice agitated and commanding.  A glance over his shoulder gives him the stolen short image of a dark skinned man with an eye patch settled over one eye, he looks ever serious in the long coat he’s wearing.  “Stop him!”

Problem is, Steve isn’t sure where to go from here.  He doesn’t know how extensive these tunnels are, doesn’t know which turn leads to a dead end and which leads to an exit.  Each twist and curl of brickwork is a gamble on its own and Steve’s never been fond of bets. 

The sound of rubble shifting behind him alerts Steve to the fact that he’s got a pursuer and whoever they are, they sound fast.  He’s not going to risk looking over his shoulder now, not when every moment was valuable in his plan for escape, not when he had to focus his mind of choosing the right combination of tunnels to find an out.

The gravel beneath him shifts and dances over the ground as Steve skids around a corner, takes a few steps before halting.  Where he stands is a large drop off and leaning over it, he can see that the nearest level is quite a ways down.  Across the broken path is another and the start to another tunnel but if he jumps and misses… well.

Steve turns, hoping that there will be enough time for him to correct his mistake but he gets barely a foot before the familiar thin frame of the red head comes into view. 

“I highly advise against this.”  She states and she’s not even out of breath, her tone just as silky as it had been back in the room.  Her hands are lax at her sides and her feet spread evenly apart, a stance he knows well; offensive. 

Steve locks his eyes with hers, “Yeah, I’ve never been one to take advice real well.”  She has barely a moment to react before Steve is turning on his foot, making the few feet towards the edge of that hazardous drop off and propelling himself off of it as if it were the only thing to do.  For a moment, he feels as if that’s it, he’s just suspended in the air and he can see how far down that fall is.  The slam of the stone work hits him hard in the chest and Steve throws his arms out, scrambling for purchase.  His fingers catch the grooves of the cobblestone and he grunts as he tugs, pulling himself up onto the ledge easily.

Maybe that would do well enough to put some needed distance between him and his pursuer.  Still, Steve doesn’t stay long enough to find out.  Before he can even read her face, he’s off again.  This tunnel is different than the other-- there’s no light. At first, it’s hard for his eyes to adjust and he spends most of his time feeling around and bumping into the cold walls.  It gets easier after a while, when his eyes have adjusted to the dark well enough that he can vaguely make out shapes and patterns.

It’s after about several more turns and twists that Steve’s eyes finally catch sight of something metal in the darkness.  It’s the only other abnormality in the expanse of stone work that composed the tunnels and the hope in his gut wants to tell him that it’s a door.  He prays it’s a door that’s not welded shut.

Steve’s hands all but slam onto the rusted metal, sliding until they find the rough handle.  It creaks as he pulls, the metal resisting for only a few moments before it gives and the growing crack sends beams of dim light across the gray ground.  The door lurches as he pushes it as far open as he can get it, his nails scraping against the rusted orange and brown of the door as he steps forward and out into the light.

What he sees is something he had never expected to see, something that twists sharp in his gut and makes the sense of dread well in his chest.  He’s never felt so sick, he thinks, not even when he was young and bedridden with the flu or some other ailment.  He’s never felt the bile so strongly at the back of his throat, never been so aware of the shaking in his knees and the sweatiness of his palms.

What he sees all around him is a horror he’d hoped they’d never see.

Once more there’s the scuffling of gravel behind him before that too falls silent.  There’s a beat of silence, just one as if she were trying to let him take it all in… and damn is it a lot to ingest. 

“I tried to warn you.”  She speaks finally and her voice is no longer the dangerous silk it had been but more of a soft velvet, careful and gentle and almost nurturing. 

What Steve Rogers sees is the sickly grey of the skies above, thick with clouds.  He sees the dark buildings of Manhattan, so easily recognizable and yet no longer the place he remembered.  On the buildings he’d grown up seeing hung large red tapestries, in the center of which was placed a white circle and a stark black Swastika.  They hung hauntingly from several of the buildings in Steve’s sight, flowing softly in the light breeze.

 Overhead Steve could hear the sound of airplanes, far too close and far too low to be flying over the city.  Sirens echo in the distance, shrill and taking him back to his days just before he’d crashed that plane.   Had he done that all for nothing?

Steve closes his eyes, lets out a shaky breath between his parted lips before turning to face the woman behind him.  She offers him the kindest of smiles, as kind as a smile could possibly be outlined in blood red. 

“How long have I been asleep?” 

Instead of giving Steve the answer to his question, she merely steps to the side to offer him a passage back into the network of underground tunnels.  “We’ve got a lot of explaining to do.  Let’s do it where it’s safe.”


	2. There's No Justice, There's Just Us

The room that they’re sat in is a large space that’s actually closed off with a door, unlike the smaller alcove he’d woken up in earlier.  By this point, Steve’s worked out that they’re situated in the network of Manhattan underground tunnels.  The subway tunnels had been constructed in 1847 and connected Manhattan Island to Brooklyn.  The problem was that the tunnels were so extensive that Steve wasn’t sure just where in them they sat.

He’d heard about the underground growing up in Brooklyn and he’d be lying if he didn’t whisk his best friend, Bucky, out a few times in search of the abandoned networks.  They’d never really been able to find them.  Steve takes a bitter moment to mark that adventure off his list.

There’s a mass of clutter in the room ranging from supplies in boxes marked with big red plus signs and loopy cursive scrawls that Steve can’t very well read to crates that very closely resembled the ammunition crates he remembered from the war.  The boxes are stacked neatly along the walls that close in the room in towering piles and a clipboard hangs idly on the wall near the door, the lined paper marked here and there with a range of different handwriting.  Along the far wall and between a few more stacks of supply boxes are two rather large bookshelves.  They’re packed full of books and files, all labeled neatly with dates and locations. And finally, beside the bookshelves are several filing cabinets, the contents of which Steve cannot distinguish but the lock on each cabinet tells him that they likely hold crucial information.

Spread along the wall line are bracketed dome lights, each shining a soft yellow glow to illuminate the edges of the room and stacks of boxes.  In the center of the room, hanging just over the large round table at which Steve was sat, was a single hanging light.  It swayed here and there as vehicles (Steve assumes them to be German transportation lines) pass on the streets just overhead.

Around the wooden table are situated a mixed assortment of chairs, only four of which were being occupied at this time.  They’re evenly spaced around the table every couple of chairs, two faces Steve recognizes from him recent attempt to escape whatever this was.

Sitting to his left is the red headed woman.  Her hands are folded neatly around the metal mug on the table in front of her, warm steam rising from the liquid that filled the cup.  She’d brought in four of the mugs shortly after she’d brought Steve to the room, one for each of the people seated here, and Steve had yet to touch his.

To Steve’s right is the man he caught a brief look at earlier.  He looks even more intimidating up close with his lips set into that sort of permanent looking frown and his one good eye locked on Steve as if he were going to try to make another escape even though his first words to Steve upon entering the room had been, “Let’s be clear, you’re not our prisoner.”

And finally, across the table from Steve sits someone he didn’t recognize.  This man has his own dented metal cup held in one hand resting against the dark wood, his feet propped up on the table, and his chair balanced on two legs.  He hasn’t shut up since they got here.

“I think we’re all accounted for in your super-secret meeting, Fury.”  The guy pointedly says, directing his attention to the man situated on Steve’s right.  There’s something about the way that the first man talks that seems vaguely familiar to Steve, as if he’d known someone in the past that he was reminded of.  “Can we get started before I die of old age?  Banner and I are kinda looking into something back at the lab.”

“If I recall,” The man with the eye patch (Fury, if he’d heard the first guy correctly) starts.  He’s sitting at the table sideways, his right arm resting along the top his body directed towards Steve but his eyes are on the guy across from him.  “You weren’t invited to this meeting, you invited yourself.  Feel free to let yourself out at any time, Stark, you know where the door is.”

Steve’s brows furrow at the familiar name.  Blue hues flit over to the first man who, due to Fury’s lashing, was frowning over his mug of dark roast.  “Wait a second,” Steve speaks up for the first time since he’d reluctantly followed the red headed woman back to this room.  The chair squeaks lightly against his bulk as he leans forward, rests one arm against the rough top of the table and gestures with a finger across from him.  “Stark?”

Steve’s sure he’s never seen a frown flip into a grin so fast in his entire life.  The mug in his hand makes no noise as he sets it down, “Tony.” He introduces himself, remaining seated in his chair.  This is where people usually offer their hands for a curtesy handshake, but Steve gets the feeling that this guy doesn't like to play by anyone’s rules but his own.

“I knew a--“

Before he can even get out what he’d been planning on saying Tony has interrupted him.  Steve decides right then and there that he doesn't like this guy’s manners very much.  “Howard Stark.  I know.”  He states, “Howard was my father.”

So he’s met Tony and he’s met this Fury character… Steve’s eyes shift to rest on the ever silent woman sitting to his left.  She’s yet to say a word and Steve could almost laugh at the thought that she was being silent enough for both herself and Howard’s son.  Her red lips quirk up lightly, offering him a smile that he’s not sure is comforting or intimidating on her hard to read face.

“You've already met Natasha.”  Fury breaks the new-found silence, gesturing with one hand across the table from himself to the woman.  “We were hoping things would go smoother when you woke up.  The thing is, Rogers, the world’s fallen into a bit of trouble since you went to sleep.”

If a ‘bit of trouble’ is what Fury meant by the fact that the Nazi flag was hanging off of all the major buildings in Manhattan that Steve saw earlier… then it’s a bit of an understatement.  What Steve would classify this as is a nightmare.  He’d fought to stop the Nazis from doing just this to other countries, fought to stop the genocide and the terror and he’d thought that just maybe with his last act he’d done a pretty good job.

He’d been so, so wrong.

“Last thing I remember was goin’ down.”  If this weren't a serious moment and Steve hadn’t elected to ignore the quirk of Tony’s lips across from him, he would have called him out on it.  The last thing that Steve needed to do was get involved in a scuffle over what was appropriate in the current situation when he was finally getting the information he’d sought from the moment he woke up.

Beside him Fury’s chair creaks as he sits up, Steve’s eyes drop to the folder sitting just under Fury’s large fingers.  “It’s been a few years since then.”  His fingers curl around the folder and he picks it up, tosses it so that the tattered looking folder lands in front of Steve’s hands with a light thump.

“How many years is a ‘few’, exactly?”  Steve’s fingers find the corner of the folder, brushing gently over the paper before he slides his index finger under and pushes the flap open.  The first page is what appears to be a newspaper clipping, the paper faded tan and aged.  The date on the top is late 1944 and the headline reads, _Loss of an American Hero_ with the familiar face Steve knows as his own just under it.

The next bit of paper is a headline from the following year, May 25, 1945.  _World War II Over, Hitler’s Rise to World Power._  

Steve’s fingers are trembling now as they hold the delicate clippings, his eyes scanning over the articles but unable to actually read them to the full.  He gets just what he needs to know from the headlines themselves and the pictures that accompany them, sees the change in the way the papers are written when it seems Germany establishes its control over the world.

The papers stop telling of the horrors, of the bloodshed and the loss, and start coating it with victory and false security; German publishing.  It’s all become censored, media publishing having gone through the process of approval by the German courts before it can be published to the public.

“Seventy years.”  Tony speaks up finally as Steve flips the page again to see a black and white photograph of a ditch full of lifeless bodies.  He pauses on the image, takes in the date and the women and children piled there as if their lives were meaningless.  Steve had seen a lot of sickening things in his life but nothing was ever quite as gut-wrenching as this.

He tears his eyes away from the image, locks them on Tony’s and repeats, “Seventy?”

“Well, sixty-eight, to be exact.” Natasha adds next to him.  She leans across the table, her slim fingers finding the cover of the folder as she flips it closed.  “Don’t do that to yourself.  Not all at once.”

Resting his hands back on top of the folder, Steve draws in a deep breath.  Natasha offers a warm smile as he finally reaches for his mug of coffee, the liquid having gone lukewarm by now, and downs it in one large gulp.  “Be nice to have something a little stronger.  How the hell did this happen?  I thought the war was pretty much won when we took care of HYDRA and Schmidt.”

“The thing is,” Fury speaks up this time, “After you crashed in the ice, the war continued.  A scientist named Arnim Zola utilized his advanced exo-skeleton battle armour for the German army.”

The name brings an image of a face to Steve’s mind and it makes his chest feel as if it were on fire.  “Zola, I remember him.”  How could he forget someone like that?  “Bucky’s unit was captured and experimented on by Zola in ’43.”

The image of his friend strapped to that table the day Steve had gone in to rescue them was an image that had haunted Steve ever since.  Bucky had never talked about what had happened to him in that HYDRA base back then and Steve had never asked, he’d always figured that if Buck wanted to talk about it then he would when he was ready.

Unfortunately, Steve had never gotten the chance to talk with Bucky about it.  He still blames himself for that.

“The armour alone gave them an advantage, our guns couldn’t even touch them.”  Fury finishes, reaching to reopen the file that Natasha had pushed closed.  He flips to the back, taps his index finger across the picture there and Steve leans in to observe it.

It’s something Steve had only ever thought he’d see in artwork and science fiction, something little boys only ever imagined, and something that seemed so out of reach for their time.  On the paper and printed in black and white is the image of a German soldier settled into piloting a large machine.  The machine looks to be controlled from the inside by the airplane similar yokes the soldier had his fingers wrapped around.  It looked like thee giant robots that Steve only ever dreamed of when he was little.

The glass looks to be bulletproof, or at least Steve would assume it is some sort of strengthened glass if bullets couldn’t so much as touch it.

“By 1945, they’d won the war.”  Natasha says solemnly beside him, “And by 1946, Germany controlled the world.  There’s a Nazi base in every major city in every country and soldiers patrol the streets every moment of every day.  This is the world we live in now.”

An obnoxious scraping noise fills the room for a brief moment as Tony pushes his chair out, stands and crosses the room to one of the stacks of boxes.  “Fortunately,” he begins and Steve can’t even imagine how anything would be considered fortunate in this situation.  There’s a shuffling noise as he roots around in the box, a soft clink and he withdraws a bottle.  “They still haven’t found our little base down here.”

The cap of the bottle twists off easily and Tony begins to make his rounds pouring the amber liquid into each empty mug on the table.  The bottle is set down in front of his own chair and Steve is honestly surprised the chair doesn’t collapse when Tony drops his weight onto it.

“The Manhattan Underground was cemented off in all of the entrances that the Nazis knew about.  But the network of tunnels down here is so large that they were bound to miss an entrance or two.”  Natasha explains, twisting her nose up at the liquid in her mug.  “You know I prefer vodka.”  She breaks off to comment at Tony who gives a sort of half-assed shrug.  Despite this, she raises the glass to her lips and takes a sip of the liquid anyway.

Steve couldn’t imagine what it must be like to live underground like this.  It was dark and he figured it must get cold fairly easily… and yet it had to be better than living on top where Nazi Germany ran the shots. “So they think they’ve blocked the underground off?”

“Exactly.”  Tony speaks up this time, tipping his head back to down the contents of his own mug.  “They think they’ve got it all out of order so they aren’t worrying about it.  But we’ve managed to take down a few of the seals over some of the exits and, thanks to Banner and I, replace them with security doors.  We’ve got the tunnels clear from here to Brooklyn Heights and we can safely get around between the two without them ever knowing we’re on the move.”

Steve takes one look around the room again, at the supplies and the ammunition crates, at the bookshelves and filing cabinets and then at the large map on the wall that he hadn’t noticed before.  It’s got different points marked in red and others marked in green… and it’s the map that hits Steve. 

“Is this the rebellion?”

For the first time since he’d met him, Nick Fury smiles.  “Welcome to S.H.I.E.L.D.”


End file.
